Belief

As people become more intelligent they care less for preachers and more for teachers.

Robert Green Ingersoll, 1833–1899, American political leader


The beginning of wisdom is the awareness that there is insufficient evidence that a god or gods have created us and the recognition that we are responsible in part for our own destiny. Human beings can achieve this good life, but it is by the cultivation of the virtues o intelligence and courage, not faith and obedience, that we will most likely be able to do so.

Paul Kurtz, Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Council for Secular Humanism


A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men.

Bertrand Russell, 1872–1970, philosopher, mathematician, social reformer and pacifist.


The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact than a drunken man is happier than a sober one.

George Bernard Shaw, 1856–1950, playwright


Nothing is so firmly believed as that which is least known.

Michel de Montaigne, 1533–1592, Renaissance scholar


Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.

Aldous Huxley, 1894–1963, writer


A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.

David Hume, 1711–1776, philosopher, economist & historian


The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact than a drunken man is happier than a sober one.

George Bernard Shaw, 1856-1950, playwright


When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad. That’s my religion.

Abraham Lincoln, 1809–1865, 16th President of the United States of America


Reason, Observation and Experience – the Holy Trinity of Science – have taught us that happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so.

Robert Green Ingersoll, 1833–1899, American political leader


When we stop supposing that beauty, wonder, love, magic, and comedy would have to come from something outside, we can start having some respect for the human mind. And yes, the human soul.

Jax Agnesson, poster on the Think Humanism forum